A/N: My sole purpose in writing this fic: no happiness. Yes, my very first attempt at Angst and Drama. No happiness. I'll try my best to kick anything named 'happiness' out of this fic. (But nooo, Hokuto just has to jump in and ruin everything!! Okay, so Hokuto will be the only one who's allowed to be cheerful in this fic.)

Warning: OOC Seishirou (that's why it's an AU!), rape (nothing graphic though), blood, unhappiness…

Disclaimer: I don't own X or TB or anything like that.

~*~ Crystal ~*~

Chapter 1: Crystalline Tears.

Deep inside eyes overflowing with tears

The blue moon falls to pieces

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The night was peaceful, and beautiful. The wind rustled gently through trees, scattering the coolness of the night. It'd just rained. The ground was still wet; the delicate flower petals were still damped with crystalline tears from heaven…

He didn't know why, but he always had a feeling that every time it rained, it was like they were tears, not raindrops. Crystal tears… crying in loneliness and unfathomable pains… tears that were soothing but also drowned him in cold and despair… Tears were dripping from the yellow leaves, the dying petals, soaked the forlorn silver moon. It was as if all of them were crying… for the lost souls, for lives of the loners, for the hidden pains, for… him… Or maybe, the one who was crying was him.

Cool tears… washed away all the shields and walls he had built up… washed away all the frozen icy shields surrounding his heart, leaving his bare pains behind, revealing his true self, even though just for a moment… He was glad. Somehow he was glad that just for a moment, he could see himself, not the empty shell he hid in everyday. Rain and tears… freed him… they drowned him in his bottomless world of darkness…

And here teardrops were falling again. He smiled bitterly. Crystalline tears were dripping from his hair; he didn't even notice his shirt was soaked wet now. He didn't feel cold. He never felt cold… because he was always cold. He was cold from inside his heart, his soul. He was always so cold inside that the coldness outside was nothing compared to his own heart. He was always frozen, bound inside bottomless darkness and coldness of his own heart.

Drip.

He slightly raised his head. Tears… Crying again… I feel… I feel… nothing… darkness again…

Tears were dripping. But this time, he stared at the crystalline teardrops in a fascinating daze, because they were crimson. Crimson crystalline tears… like twinkling ruby, beautiful, mysterious, like… blood.

"Seishirou."

There that chilling bell-like voice again. He smiled unconsciously. The voice of an angel, a beautiful angel… an angel of Death. Sometimes he wondered how a devil could look so beautiful and innocent like her.

She pushed her long silky black hair backwards absently and gave him back an angelic smile. Black hair on white skin. Beautiful contrast, wasn't it? But the most fascinating thing about her was her amethyst amber eyes. They were so beautiful, yet for some reason, so blank and cold, as if in them was bottomless emptiness. So was her smile. She smiled, but her smile was always empty and cold, yet still so fascinating. Maybe it was because she was so perfectly gorgeous, because she had the beauty of a doll-like angel.

But of course, she was an angel of Death. The last fragment to perfect her mystic portrait was… blood. Blood stained crimson on her hands, dripping crimson tears. Red on white. Now that was perfect.

"You should not be here. It's raining."

He could barely make out what she was saying. The things that were able to register into his mind were 'raining' and something about his unexpected appearance. He didn't care though. His eyes trailed along the dripping blood drops absently. Beautiful. Blood was always something so beautiful to him…

"I just wanted to see you."

A deep hoarse voice spoke. It took him a while to realize that it was his own voice. He wondered since when his voice had become that strange. Or was it his real voice? Broken, empty, and lost, just like his soul.

She smiled again, and as usual, that disturbing smile never reached her eyes. She knew, as well as him, that excuse was only a lie, a blatant lie. She didn't care though. In fact, she almost never cared about anything, except for him. That was why she accepted that lie without question.

She grazed gently towards him, her hair flowing in the cool breeze. Raindrops had soaked wet her kimono, made the silk fabric cling heavily to her small body. It was strange that she still looked so heavenly graceful under the rain after one hour.

One of her blood-stained hands rested on his arm slightly. The first thing came to his mind at that moment was 'cold'. Her hand was cold, the hand that had just taken away the life of another one in the rain few minutes ago. The hand with delicate fingers firmly guided him inside without the slightest hesitation, though her movements were still gentle as always. He didn't need to look back to know that a swirl of sakura petals was forming behind him, covering the dead.

They walked in; neither of the two said anything. Words were unnecessary between them. Her hand absently traveled upwards the buttons of his shirt. She lovingly unbuttoned his shirt while caressing the bare skin the shirt revealed after every button undone, then totally took it off his shoulders. He was silent the whole time.

She eyed the blood prints she had left on his white shirt with a somewhat strange expression, and then looked at him for a while. Muscular chest, tan skin, dark bangs were dripping wet on his handsome feature, beautiful amber eyes gazing at her blankly… Wait, blank eyes?

She sighed slightly, then gestured him to go and take a shower. So that was why she'd felt something strange about him lately. He's gone Within. Again.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Sakura falling… Beautiful…

"Do you like sakura?"

Mysterious smile… Can't see his face… his eyes…

"Sakura are usually white… pure white… like fresh snow…"

Emptiness… darkness… coldness… I'm scared… He's… touching me… looking at me… His breath against my skin…

"Do you know why these sakura blossoms are pink?"

His hands… hot… on my skin…

"The sakura feeds on the blood of the corpses buried beneath it."

I can feel sadness… pains… despair… why? I can't hear anymore… breaths… heated sensations… skin on skin… weight… I can't… breathe… I am drowning…

"SUBARU!!"

He jolted up with a start, and had a feeling that he came face to face with a mirror. Except that this mirror turned him into a girl.

"Geez, Subaru! What have you been dreaming about? I had to call you at least ten times!" Sumeragi Hokuto scowled her twin brother in concern. She was really worried. When Subaru was a kid, he had never had this kind of nightmare. This had started only two years ago. He would moan, sometimes scream in his sleep as if being tortured very painfully, and then wake up with a start, bathing in sweat, remembering nothing. She tried to ask him, but he couldn't recall anything from his nightmares. Something definitely had happened, and she was worried.

Subaru was bathed in sweat. His face, no, his whole body flushed for some unknown reason to him, though he was sure that it was somehow related to his dream… However, he couldn't remember what he had dreamed about.

It was always like that. Sometimes he would wake up from a nightmare with this strange heated feeling, but he could never remember exactly the content of those dreams. The more he tried to remember, the blurrier those images became. But they had never been anything so strong like this time. That was strange…

"…Anyway, you have a job this morning." Subaru looked up at his twin sister, realized in embarrassment that she'd been talking to him the whole time but he hadn't heard a thing. Luckily, before he could ask anything, Hokuto had thrown a fax at him. Ah yeah, work.

Subaru absently scanned through the information as usual in his still sleepy state. But when his eyes reached the name of the client, he abruptly stopped dead and felt very awake. His eyes widened in shock as he read again the name loudly, as if he thought he was still dreaming.

"Sakurazuka Setsuka? Sakurazuka?? Hokuto-chan, what is this?" He looked at his sister with wonder and confusion, hoping that she could somehow explain this impossible situation to him.

Hokuto flopped down next to him on the bed, wearing an unusual solemn expression.

"I don't know. I'm not sure why the Sakurazuka need our help, when they are also very good at onmyoujitsu. In addition, it's also a wonder why grandmother agreed to this. Aren't two clans enemies? And the client can even be the Sakurazukamori who wants to set up a trap! Hmm… why is a Sakurazuka seeking the help of their enemy?" Hokuto frowned, tapping her chin.

"Not everyone with the name Sakurazuka is bad." Subaru unconsciously spoke. Hokuto was startled and turned to him with a questioning look. Subaru blushed under her direct disbelieved gaze and hurriedly continued.

"I mean, grandmother used to say so… In fact, the Sakurazukamori is only one person, right? We can't judge people as bad just because their name is Sakurazuka. They even may not know anything about onmyoujitsu or the rival between two clans. They may be just normal people, and they need help, so I'll help them." Subaru looked down, but his voice was firm.

"If you say so." Hokuto looked at her brother for a while, but then her expression softened. Her brother was really so kind. Her smile immediately widened when a thought struck her.

"So, let me see, which clothes you would wear for this job…" Subaru immediately choked and turned blue in horror. Hokuto's smile was really evil now, and that was not good…

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Subaru looked at the big house in front of him, feeling somewhat strange. The house was very beautiful, a mixture of traditional and modern life. It gave him a distinct impression that the owner was absolutely no short of money. But something about it made his spine feel cold. There was a strange aura surrounding the house, giving him the feeling of an ancient sanctuary.

Suddenly the door was opened. Subaru jumped in surprise when he suddenly came face to face with a very beautiful woman. He automatically took a step back, because something about her just screamed 'scary' at him.

She was young, or at least seemed so. She had the innocent beauty of an angel from heaven, but her gaze at him seemed too keen and mature to be a young girl's. Long silky black hair fell like a spring fall upon her delicate shoulders. And her eyes…Amber eyes gazed at him with something he couldn't describe, but despite that, her expression was totally blank, emotionless. She gave him a small smile, but her smile never reached her eyes.

Subaru felt cold all of sudden. This woman was making his theory about 'innocent normal people' crumble into sand. He swallowed difficultly when she gently invited him in without asking anything.

"Sumeragi Subaru-san, we've been waiting." She nodded her head slightly, still keeping her strange smile at him. Her soft bell-like voice sent chill down his spine. How did she know who he was without asking anything? Subaru reluctantly followed her into the house while recalling what his conversation with Hokuto before he'd left.

"Be careful, Subaru. You still need to be alert in case anything happens… It's best to be prepared for everything, right?"

"Really, Hokuto-chan, I'll be fine. If it was dangerous, grandmother wouldn't let me go, would she? She is the one that's most sensitive about the Sakurazuka problems."

"I know, but… just be careful, okay?"

"Okay. Thanks, Hokuto-chan."

Now he was definitely curious to know why grandmother sent him on this job. His instinct told him that this was dangerous. Or at least, this woman was dangerous. He guessed she had to be Sakurazuka Setsuka, the client. He was curious to see the Sakurazuka who was having troubles. His name was Sakurazuka Seishirou – twenty-five years old, according to the fax he'd received. Subaru wondered about the relationship between this woman and that man. Were they siblings? Or… husband and wife?

Setsuka guided him towards a door at the end of the hall and gently opened it. The room was filled with light from the garden outside. Though the cool and fresh winds were flooding the room with faint flowers' fragrance, it still had a feeling of death.

At the other end of the room was a very large bed, and a man was sitting motionlessly between soft pillows. Subaru assumed that this man was Sakurazuka Seishirou. From this distance, he couldn't see him very clearly.

"Sakurazuka-san, please go outside." Subaru said gently to Setsuka. He thought that she would protest, but the woman just smiled slightly and nodded, then stepped out of the room. He heard a soft click as the door was closed behind him, then he started walking towards the bed.

Subaru did his best to suppress a gasp when he approached the older man. His first impression of Sakurazuka Seishirou was that the older man was devastatingly handsome. His hair was silky soft, dark bangs fell carelessly in front of his eyes. His half-opened beautiful amber eyes were gazing blankly into the space.

Subaru noticed that he was pale and seemed very tired, despite his motionless state. He wondered what had put a gorgeous person like this into so much suffering that he decided to hide himself Within. The older man looked like an angel from heaven, a true angel, unlike Setsuka… He seemed familiar somehow. Subaru felt as if they'd met long ago…

The green-eyed onmyouji suddenly snapped out of it. He swallowed hastily and gingerly sat down next to the bed. He had to concentrate on his work. Subaru leaned closer to the man's handsome face and began to chant… going deeper into the soul of this familiar angel…

~*~*~*~*~*~ End Chapter 1 ~*~*~*~*~*~

A/N: What a depressing Seishirou… A new challenge, I can say.

So Subaru is a normal sixteen-year-old onmyouji in this fic, like he is in Tokyo Babylon. Seishirou is still twenty-five. Setsuka hasn't died. Ah, in case you haven't guessed, she's still the Sakurazukamori. I wonder if I should add Kamui into this… Maybe not, Fuuma is enough. Yeah, Fuuma is in the next chapter.

So, what will Subaru discover when he goes within Seishirou's mind? How will the older man react to him? Wait for it till the next chapter!